Artane grandmother Anne Conroy brings her young grandchildren, Liam and James, to the beach because she wants them to share the same memories of the bay.

"They love being down here but thankfully they are happy to stay in the sand. It's a real pity for those who use the beach to swim," she said.

This is not the first time this summer that those wanting to take a dip have been warned away from beaches around the country. Last month, heavy rainfall caused a rise in bacteria levels on Sandymount strand in Dublin and Ballyloughane beach in Galway.

Meanwhile, Ireland is set to be spared the wrath of a tropical storm making its way across the Atlantic, with temperatures around the high teens or low 20s forecast for the rest of this week and the next.

Met Eireann has stressed that 'Bertha' will be classed as "an ex-hurricane" by the time it reaches land on Sunday.

"A lot of these lows at this time of the year begin as hurricanes or storms in the Gulf of Mexico but as they cross the Atlantic they lose some of their power and become more normalised lows," Siobhan Ryan said.

Met Eireann said parts of the south could suffer some heavy rainfall, but added that the UK would be hit worst by the bad weather.

"The eye is around 200 miles to the south of Ireland on Saturday," she said.

"It won't great here in Ireland, with scattered outbreaks of rain across the country and maybe a little bit more persistent in the south. There's nothing necessarily untoward at the moment, though," she added.